White House Diaries

Thursday, May 9, 1985

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A busy day. Briefing before leaving Queluz at 10 A.M. for Sao Bento & a meeting with P.M. Soares (we too have met previously in U.S.). We met privately for about 15 mins.—some photos etc. then downstairs to a plenary. We covered a number of subjects with a great deal of agreement on all. He & I then went into garden & delivered statements to the press. Incidentally there had been some demonstrations about me & a lot of graffiti but I noticed it usually linked me with Soares. The dissidents didn’t like either of us.

At noon he took me over to the Assembly where I met the officers of that body plus reps. of the 7 parliamentary groups and Counsel of the Parliament. There was a gift exchange & a guest book signing. Then into the Assembly Chamber. Pres. Amaral made an opening speech & introduced me, at which point a group to my left—both physically & philosophically got up and walked out. The great majority was warm in it’s response to my remarks.

Nancy joined me and after a switch of cars at Queluz we drove to Sintra Palace. We were in a Ford Grenada because the limos couldn’t get up to the palace because of the narrow road & short turns. It’s an old palace started by the Moors on a steep mountain side. It was a 2 P.M. lunch but very pleasant. Back to Queluz for 10 mins. then a meeting with Dr. Lucas Pires—Pres. of the Center Social Dem. party—he is a conservative. The govt. is basically Socialist but is moderate regarding pvt. enterprise. We had a few hours rest then before we had to get into Black tie. First down stairs a press reception for all the assembled press foreign & American. From there it was on to the St. dinner at Ajuda Palace. We & the Eanes’s did a receiving line before dinner. The dinner was held in a magnificent room—three long tables the length of the room & a speakers table across the room at the head of the 3 tables. He & I did brief toast remarks then back to Queluz.